


Means to Our End

by kutubiyya



Series: Distractions and Complications [4]
Category: Cricket RPF
Genre: Angst, Denial of Feelings, Hales is seen but not heard, I hope, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Phone Sex, all kinds of denial actually, and the general miscommunication you all know and love, except of course it isn't a relationship, former teammates having Opinions on twitter, presumably you've stopped reading by now if you don't, the best kind of Hales?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-28
Updated: 2017-04-28
Packaged: 2018-10-24 23:31:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10752036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kutubiyya/pseuds/kutubiyya
Summary: “What are you wearing?”“Uh… basically the same as last night?”“You’re not really getting into the spirit of this.”--Out of form, out of ideas, your leadingboyfriendbowler absent due to injury, and Kevin Pietersen chipping in from twitter: how many ways can a limited-overs tour go wrong?At least one more.(Colombo, Pallekele and Hambantota, Sri Lanka; November-December 2014)





	Means to Our End

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to twistsofsilver/twowittoowhoo, who helped me keep going when I got halfway through a previous, much longer version of this fic, and realised that it wasn't working at all and needed to be scrapped.
> 
> Helpful visual reference to my characters, for anyone stumbling across this fic through tags (or anyone [e.g. Ro] who is labouring under the misapprehension that the 2014 ODI kit was not the best ODI kit), l-r: [Joe, Eoin, Alastair, someone I can't see, Finny](https://kutubiyya.tumblr.com/post/160080887707/thesturridge-am-i-the-only-one-who-thinks-they). And [here is the photo of Jimmy](https://kutubiyya.tumblr.com/post/160082149627) that gets mentioned during the fic, plus [some gifs of the photoshoot](https://kutubiyya.tumblr.com/post/100004512512/i-think-i-lost-like-five-minutes-just-staring-at).
> 
> All comments and kudos very much welcomed; a bit of encouragement would not go amiss right now :)

_Today, I don’t have it in me to wait_  
_So I will dig up my plan to escape_  
_We are breaking in half_  
_The wait pulls us apart_

\--Spring Offensive, ‘Everything Other Than This’  
([lyrics](http://fuckyeahspringoffensive.tumblr.com/lyrics) [you'll need to scroll or ctrl+f to find the right ones]; [listen [live version](https://kutubiyya.tumblr.com/post/160080855212/spring-offensive-everything-other-than-this)])

  

\----

 

“What are you wearing?”

“So we’re really doing this, then? The phone sex thing?”

\--

It’s not that Alastair spends the start of the Sri Lanka tour _avoiding_ Finny. That would be weird. And, well, impossible, what with needing to captain the man, and everything.

He’s just busy. In demand. Tricky to pin down.

Not, it has to be said, for want of trying on Finny’s part.

Finny’s beaming smile is basically the first thing Alastair sees when he strides into the private lounge at Heathrow. It’s a lovely sunny smile; even at thirty paces, Alastair can _feel_ the delight radiating from the other man. The smile follows Alastair, brightness undiminished, all the way from London to Colombo: when Alastair sinks into his pre-assigned seat next to Mo on the plane, and again while he spends the coach ride to the hotel feigning fascination with Hales’ tales of beating Jos at Fifa the last time they toured together.

And so it goes on: the smile dogs Alastair’s steps – at breakfast, in the gym, out in the nets – despite his efforts to pretend he hasn’t noticed it, or the secrets threatening to spill out of it.

But when, three days in, a knock sounds at his hotel door – when he has to change his stance in front of the peephole because the man on the other side is too tall to be seen, properly, from the usual angle – he knows he can’t hide any longer.

By the time they’re on their second cup of tea, he’s let himself be drawn through the (carefully) edited highlights of the summer, losing the battle against every single smile of his own along the way. Lightheaded with relief at being able to talk about this, he isn’t sure, anymore, why he _wanted_ to hide.

Then comes the eyebrow lift; and the smirk. “Is he, you know… What’s he like? In bed?”

(Well, _there’s_ a reason.)

Alastair freezes with his mug halfway to his mouth. He’s glad he wasn’t actually drinking when Finny spoke. “No way,” he mumbles, feeling heat creep across his face. “Not a _chance_.”

Finny throws himself back against the bed, his peals of laughter ringing around the room. It takes him a while to recover; long enough for Alastair to seriously consider making a joke about Broady’s extra-large condoms. He looks around for a pillow to hide behind.

When Finny sits back up, he’s wiping his eyes, and still chuckling. “That was amazing. I’ve never seen someone look smug _and_ terrified at the same time.”

“I can get you sent home, you know.” Alastair quickly drops the pillow he definitely wasn’t _actually_ going to hide behind, and frowns at the other man. “I could do that.”

“Come _on_. What’s he like?” Finny holds up a hand, with a grin. “Wait, grumpy! Is the answer grumpy? I bet it’s grumpy.”

Alastair smothers laughter under a cough. He inspects the reflection of the overhead light on the surface of his tea until he can keep his tone level. “Sometimes,” he says. “In the mornings. He’s not a fan.”

Saying this is a mistake. Alastair gets a flash of memory: the morning at Broady’s flat; Jimmy waking up in his arms, and staying there. For a bit, anyway.

(Here’s another reason Alastair’s been dodging Finny: he knew a chat like this would come laden with traps. That there are certain habits of mind he can’t afford to fall into.)

Finny’s chuckling. “Yeah, that’s not news. Not to… well, anyone who’s actually _met_ your boyfriend.”

“Oh. He’s not—”

“I know, Broady said. Mr Grumpy doesn’t like the word, right?” Finny drains his mug; pats Alastair absently on the back. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell if you don’t.”

(Habits of mind like letting well-meaning friends convince him the affair is something it’s not.)

( _I can’t give you what you want_ , Jimmy said, back in London.)

Alastair opens his mouth for a firmer denial, but Finny’s already talking again.

“Never mind. Can’t help being curious, though. Jimmy had a rep, back in the day – you know, bit of a player or whatever. Player as in—” Finny mutters under his breath, then laughs, awkwardly. “Uh, yeah. I’m sure that’s all past, though.”

In the ensuing silence, Alastair doesn’t deliberately try to wait Finny out; he genuinely doesn’t know what to say. Where to begin, or if he wants so. Either way, Finny doesn’t let the quiet last for long.

“Okay, so I feel like Hales now: _ayyy,_ _give us the blow-by-blow_ …” He clears his throat. “Sorry, skip. Probably time I shut up, isn’t it?”

Alastair shakes his head. “It’s fine.” (It’s not, but Finny doesn’t need to know that.) “I’m just not the kiss-and-tell type, you know?” He shrugs, with a smile. “It’s not like there’s much to gossip _about_ , anyway. It’s… just sex.”

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“Uh… basically the same as last night?”

“You’re not really getting into the spirit of this.”

\--

Finny apologises several more times, the next day, despite Alastair’s attempts to make him stop. It’s not hard – Alastair reflects, as he lets himself back into his hotel room after dinner out with Mo and Ravi – to guess why the other man might be feeling a touch guilty:

_Jimmy had a rep, back in the day_

What _is_ hard is explaining why he’s not bothered – why he’s never been bothered – by the simple fact that Jimmy has more notches in his bedpost. Given what they’ve been getting up to these past few months, jealousy has always struck Alastair as absurd, although he’s found out the hard way that Jimmy doesn’t quite agree.

But _back in the day_ has another significance, one that has occupied his thoughts for more of the day than he would like: Michael Clarke. Come January, Alastair will be leading his team against the Aussies – against _Clarke’s_ Aussies – on their home turf. It has occurred to him, not quite for the first time but more urgently than before, that if anyone might spot what’s going on, it’s Pup; that if anyone might try to _use_ that knowledge…

He indulges a brief fantasy of facing Pup down, with an icy stare and some perfectly crafted comeback or other. He can’t take the idea seriously; and there’s really no way to do it that doesn’t involve him being a prick, in a way that’ll rebound on Jimmy.

All told, not worth it. If Alastair can survive this month without giving a piece of his mind to the press – and he can, he’s convinced of it (not that he has much choice) – he can take anything Pup flings at him in equally stoic silence.

He wrenches off his uncomfortable dress shoes, then flops back onto the bed with a sigh, enjoying the air conditioning and his full belly’s reminder of the dinner just gone. He’s replete, both from the meal itself – at the restaurant owned by Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene, menu chosen for them by their hosts – and from the conversation. Ravi and Mo are both, in their very different ways, exceptionally laidback; blessed relief, at a time when every second word from the media seems to be _Kevin_ , or _book_.

He’s lying on his phone, he realises; he can feel it in his back pocket. He rolls over just far enough so he can dig it out, then back again. Almost time – he sees, as he wakes the screen – for Jimmy’s call.

He weighs his phone in his hand a moment, considering this; imagining (for a moment) Jimmy here, actually _here_ , not just a disembodied voice murmuring fantasies across continents.

 _Disembodied_ , he thinks; then, making himself laugh: _Hands-free._

A new frontier for them, this; everything in words, starkly spelled out. No sensation to go with it, no touch but his own; no simply _feeling_ the other person respond, in that language of the body that was starting to feel like second nature.

(No company—)

The thing that _did_ once bother Alastair about Jimmy’s past (he reflects, now, keen to distract himself) wasn’t that Jimmy was more experienced. It was the way the gulf of this unspoken history stretched out between them, leaving it painfully obvious that Alastair didn’t have a clue what to do. He worried about coming across as unadventurous, unskilled; about being disappointing.

Once, in an offhand, unwise fit of bravado – an attempt to bridge the gap, just a little – he let slip that he had some history of his own. He told Jimmy that he’d had offers before, just not from the right people; implying that he _could_ have had plenty of sex, actually, he’d just _chosen_ not to.

Jimmy wouldn’t let it go. He asked then, and has asked several more times since, who those _offers_ came from. Alastair has refused, repeatedly, to not-kiss and tell.

Not least because most of the offers – almost all of them, in fact, if you discount Fred – came from the same source: Kevin Pietersen.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“You know, if we did this by Skype, you wouldn’t need to ask.”

“No Skype. But if you’re thinking about sending photos… feel free.”

\--

They say timing is everything. Turns out they’re right.

“Grumpy boyfriends, eh?” Finny’s saying, pushing a hand through his hair with a chuckle. They’re in the dressing room, sitting out the sticky Colombo heat of a rain delay that’ll eventually prove to be terminal for this second warm-up match. “Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.”

Alastair slouches back in his seat, smiling in fond, rueful recognition and resisting the urge to point out that Broady’s more petulant than grumpy, as a rule. Also, sometimes Jimmy just _pretends_ to be grumpy; sometimes you can tease a grudging smile out of him and it’s—

An all-too-familiar voice barges into his thoughts.

“ _Tell_ me about it.”

Alastair’s smile freezes into a rictus. Joe, who (Alastair could’ve sworn) was nowhere to be seen a moment ago, flops down – with a sigh – in the chair next to Finny, and throws up his hands.

“Jos is in _such_ a mood today.”

Alastair can feel the heat in his face, but keeps the inevitable panicked litany of swearwords firmly inside his head. (Years of facing the press have been good for something.) Joe can’t have heard anything important. Can he? Shit, Jimmy’s going to kill him. Every time a secret’s shared, right, it—

Wait. Panic screeches to a halt, temporarily, as a key detail sidles out into its path. Did Joe just say… _Jos_?

Well. _In your face, Jimmy_ , Alastair thinks, wishing he had his phone; _told you so._

Finny’s saying something; Joe’s laughing, shoving playfully at Finny’s shoulder.

“Ey, fighting talk,” he says. “Jos isn’t even on the same _scale_ as Broady.”

Finny’s eyebrows have climbed his ample forehead. “If by _scale_ you mean _height_ , then yeah, you’re not kidding.”

Joe snorts. “I guess them long fingers must be _some_ compensation for—”

“Right, well,” Alastair cuts in, practically leaping to his feet. “I’ve got to, uh… Go. Now.”

Joe waggles his own fingers in Alastair’s direction. “What’s up, Cooky, don’t you want to hear about Broady’s special skills?”

Finny, who’s going a bit pink himself by now, bats at Joe’s hands.

Alastair suppresses another flashback to the extra-large condoms at Broady’s flat. “Frankly, no.”

“Not got a grumpy boyfriend to vent about, then?”

Alastair forces a laugh as he strides away. “Married, Joe.”

Without looking back, he half-raises his left hand, then realises it’s a match day and he’s not wearing his ring and it’d be overkill anyway, overcompensation— _Go_.

\--

“What are you wearing…?”

“Oi, that’s my line.”

“Too slow, old man.”

“Just… just shut up and get your kit off.”

“I like it when you talk dirty.”

“ _Brat_.”

\--

A problem shared is a problem halved. A secret shared is a problem doubled. At least.

Alastair clings to this warning, the day after they lose the first ODI proper. It’s his shield against the gleam of Joe’s earnest gaze; the lure of his words.

“You can talk to me, you know. If there’s anything… Anything at all. I wouldn’t tell anyone. I promise.”

Alastair makes himself look away, toward the distant figures pulling down the practice nets, before he can give into temptation. _Any_ temptation, including the urge to describe Joe’s gaze as _puppydog_ out loud. (He and Jimmy have always had a repertoire of shared references and private jokes, but of late it’s beginning to feel like the other man has colonised his brain, and he’s not even here.)

There’s just too much risk. So he’s saying nothing.

“I’ll, uh… I’ll bear that in mind. Cheers.”

In a weird way, the secret feels bigger than ever, on this tour. Somehow it’s not just the affair, now, that Alastair has to hide, but the fact that they’re in contact at all; with Jimmy not in the team, not _here_ , it feels like there’s no good excuse for Alastair to be in touch with the other man. Like it’d be giving something away if he admitted it. So he pretends to know little, and care less, about the fast bowlers’ camp; greets most questions about Jimmy’s progress back to match fitness with his best Jimmy-esque shrug.

It helps, more than he thought it would, that Finny knows some of what’s going on. But still Alastair’s holding back; not even Finny’s aware of how often he and Jimmy are talking.

(Well; _talking_ ’s one word for it.)

“Are you _sure_ you’re okay, skip?”

Alastair, still watching the ground staff at work, finds himself smiling; helplessly, distantly. He doesn’t know how to begin answering that question.

He spends his days in the gym, in the nets, in planning sessions with Pete; willing himself back into form with every stroke of the bat. At dinner in the evenings, he’s only half there, still miming shots and setting fields in his head. And then every night, at the appointed time (or, more usually, earlier), he finds excuses to slip away.

He’s never going to be a smooth liar, but he’s getting better with each passing day.

So it’s easier than it would once have been, perhaps, to put a quizzical polish on his smile as he looks back at Joe, and declares, “Everything’s fine. But thanks for asking.”

He almost means it. The Jimmy situation, after all, isn’t the only thing best kept to himself.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“A lovely red dress.”

“… _Really_?”

“Yeah, deadly serious. … No, of course not.”

“Wait, though. Fantasy, remember? Hmm… something maybe mid-thigh, not tight but sort of clingy… flimsy fabric so, you know, you can’t wear any pants underneath, because it would just _ruin_ the line of the dress…”

“…You’ve thought about this before, haven’t you?”

\--

After they lose the second ODI, KP weighs in, in typically measured fashion.

Alastair doesn’t have his own Twitter account – things like this are _why_ he doesn’t have his own Twitter account – but Kev’s words, like his book, are unavoidable.

_Dear Alastair, if you care about England’s chances this winter, pls resign and just concentrate on Test cricket... #gethalesin_

It takes every ounce of Alastair’s self-control not to hurl Ravi’s phone across the bustling restaurant when he reads this.

_If you care about England—_

Kev knows how to hurt.

Of course he does. Alastair was too young, too guileless, when he met Kev. He was precocious and naïve and desperate to pick the brain of anyone who would give him five minutes. There was an aura about Kev – glamour, charisma, restlessness – that made him seem larger than life, yet he spent almost as much time in the nets as Alastair did, and was always willing to talk, and listen.

Alastair was easy to read, and eager to share. He poured his every hope and fear into the other man’s ears, long past the point when he’d begun to suspect it was a mistake. The streak of wounded fragility in Kev that grew wider with every tour made the man’s friendship ever more uncertain ground to stand on, but Alastair could never bring himself to admit defeat.

Still, once you’ve given away that sort of advantage, you can’t regain it. No matter how many times you say, as politely as you can, _no_.

The fact is, Alastair handed Kev everything he needed to hurt him, and there’s nothing holding the other man back, anymore.

\--

“How’re you doing?”

“Just a towel.”

“I, uh… That’s not the question I asked. We can—”

“It’s the only question I’m answering. Take it or leave it.”

\--

The next morning, the morning after Kev tells the world Alastair should quit if he cares about team and country, Alastair lies late in bed. His mind runs over the same track again and again, and keeps ending up at the same conclusion: the fact that something’s hard isn’t a reason to give up, is it? Quite the opposite; it’s the reason you keep going.

(He let himself forget this, earlier this year, when he finally gave up on Kev; and look how _that_ worked out.)

He never expected it to be easy, out here in Sri Lanka. The thought of this series has been squatting at the back of his mind for months, ungainly and unwelcome: seven ODIs, against the team that won the last World Cup, amid all the humidity of the sub-continent in the rainy season. He never once doubted that it’d be a challenge; it’s just that, with the Indians in town, he could put off thinking about it.

In the release of Test victory, he let himself think – briefly – that the worst was over. That he’d finally served his sentence and emerged out the other side, with a settled team, a more secure position as captain, and his old form with the bat not quite returned, but at least visible on the horizon from where he was standing.

Then came the ODI failures against India and the press training its sights, once more, on his captaincy – led, this time, by a so-called friend.

(Alastair’s _best_ friend, really, besides Jimmy, and Jimmy doesn’t count; he’s not sure, anymore, what Jimmy is.)

Swanny’s betrayal shook Alastair, upset him, angered him; it still does. He arrived here determined to prove them all wrong, and that determination has only grown stronger since Kev threw his hat in the ring, last night. Kev will never admit he’s wrong in a thousand years, of course, but Swanny will, surely, once the team hits its stride again. Swanny’ll grin, he’ll apologise, he’ll be happy for Alastair ( _proud_ of him), and everything can go back to normal. This scenario is part of what’s kept Alastair going; he still believes it can happen.

But he also arrived here with two things against him. His batting is still letting him – and the team – down; how can he lead, if not from the front, like Straussy taught him an opener should? And he’s missing Jimmy and Broady, badly: his two key bowlers, the chalk-and-cheese new ball partners who’ve been the lynchpin of the team since before he became captain. A month-long tour would be tough enough without one of those guys; without either of them, it’s proving to be like trying to fight with one hand tied behind his back.

(A month-long tour without Jimmy, off the field as well as on it: this, too, is tough. It would have mattered less, once, or in a different way. But now, well.)

Still, Alastair wasn’t expecting it to be easy. He just has to keep fighting, one-handed or not. Right?

\--

“So what are you— No. Hang on. I _am_ going to say it. I know you don’t like hearing it, but… A break won’t kill you. One—”

“Not _this_ again.”

“— _One_ day. Just one, just while you’re travelling.”

“ _Jim_.”

“Listen, I understand. You want to put in everything you’ve got, that’s the reason I— That’s what great about you. But it isn’t always great _for_ you.”

“I know when to stop.”

“No, you— You _don’t_. All right. Give you an example. Say we’re in the middle of a session – a session in bed, I mean, not… We’re in the middle of it, and you realise you’ve lost circulation in your arms. Do you think, _Shit, better tap out so I can get that untied_ , or _Ooh, a challenge, let’s see how long I can cope with this_?”

“Come on, that was _one_ time. Anyway. Don’t you want to know what I’m wearing?”

\--

Finny’s at the door again, with his smile.

“Afternoon. I brought these two packets of hot chocolate, right, but there’s no labels, and I got them mixed up. Fancy helping me work out which is which?”

Alastair eyes him, suspicious. Jimmy texted first thing this morning ( _Put it this way. If your arms drop off, who’s going to open the batting?_ ), which made Alastair laugh (and reply, _we’re talking about nets not knife throwing mate_ ) but also put him on notice that the discussion isn’t over. If this visit from Finny turns out to be the fast bowlers’ grapevine at work, Alastair’ll be – well, his feelings will be complicated, but annoyance is definitely going to be in the mix.

“I, uh…” Also, he was about to head to the gym. “Is it really hot chocolate weather?”

Joe, as is apparently his wont, these days, comes striding right into the awkward pause.

“I’ll help.” He looks from one man to the other, then adds, slinging his arms around them both, “We can make it a meeting of the absent boyfriends club. Plus Cooky.”

While Alastair’s trying to decide how to respond to that – further denial? or will that just make him look more guilty? – Finny jumps into the breach. “Absent how? _Yours_ is just down the hall.”

Joe makes a face. “He’s lost in a Fifa haze. _Just one game_ ’s turned into best of fifteen or something, and Hales’ banter gets a bit, you know, samey after a while. Where’s your kettle, Cooky?” He ducks past them and bounds inside.

Finny catches Alastair’s gaze. “Puppy,” he mouths, and Alastair – for all the ache that’s conjured up by hearing someone else say it – can’t help but laugh.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“I’m sort of _half_ wearing a shirt, although it seems to have come unbuttoned…”

“Interesting. Tell me more.”

“Turns out Hambantota isn’t any less humid than Colombo. But we did win tonight, so…”

\--

A few days later, they’re back in Colombo and back on the losing side. For Alastair, it’s even more frustrating than usual, because he isn’t even on the field, having been handed a one-match ban for slow over rates.

This, he decides, is what quitting would feel like. Watching from the sidelines, helpless, as one of your openers goes for a first-ball duck.

 _I won’t quit. Not in a million years, Kev_.

The other problem with not captaining, of course, is that your mind becomes fertile ground for intrusive thoughts. For a while the tension helps him fend them off, but once Mo departs, and Titch and Joe settle into a rhythm, Alastair’s mind wanders.

The first time he turned Kev down, he didn’t even realise that was what he was doing.

Well. How was he supposed to _know_ that there was something more to all those offers of throw-downs? It was common knowledge that Kev worked hard on his own batting, after all; it was one of the things that drew Alastair to him. He thought the other man was just being friendly, glad of some company in the nets from the new boy.

So he didn’t think anything of it when Kev said, one evening, _Think it’s about time you let me take you out for dinner_ , or something along those lines. Alastair just smiled and said he already had plans, which he did: plans to play darts with Harmy and Freddie, specifically. Fred had flung an arm round Alastair’s neck, earlier that day, slapping his chest with a meaty hand and booming, _Don’t forget me and you’ve got a rematch tonight_. For reasons that made him a bit squirmy when he thought about them too much, or at all, Alastair could think of nowhere else he’d rather be than in Fred’s orbit.

Even when Harmy commented, later that night, that it was funny how KP _always_ seemed to turn up in the gym about ten minutes after Alastair had started working out, Alastair just laughed it off. He didn’t get what Harmy was driving at, and in any case he was pretty sure it wasn’t true; not that he’d been keeping track, but, well, it just didn’t seem very likely.

He didn’t get much chance to think about the whole thing further, though, because at that point Freddie said _Show us them arms, again, gym bunny_ , and Alastair flushed a bit, self-conscious but – as ever – unable to resist showing off for Fred.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“That t-shirt you like.”

“You forget to do laundry, or something?”

“No! I mean, yes, but… Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, all right?”

“… So many jokes. So many terrible, _really_ dirty jokes wanting to be told.”

“Well, you know. We’ve got time.”

\--

It’s enough, some days, just to hear Jimmy’s voice.

Deeper than his own, but softer with it: quiet, slightly diffident, with a certain reflexive gruffness that’s easy to mistake for grumpiness. (But Alastair can hear the smile in it, more often than not, whatever Jimmy’s reputation.) The sound of it’s like an arm sliding around his waist; like feeling something click into place that he hadn’t realised was askew.

Some days, he’d like to wrap himself up in it, to lie there and just listen. But he can’t afford to; that isn’t how this thing works. If Alastair had any illusions about that (he didn’t), Jimmy put an end to them months ago: _I can’t give you what you want_.

(It’s funny how Jimmy’s refusal, of a thing Alastair never asked for, has made him wonder: what _does_ he want? Not a relationship; not really. He just doesn’t want to be alone with it. He doesn’t want to be the only one having these confused, complicated feelings.)

He can’t admit, can’t even hint, at any of this. The phone sex, though; that he can get away with. It’s justification; it’s cover.

No, _cover_ ’s the wrong word; makes it sound like he doesn’t enjoy the phone sex, when he does. It has its drawbacks compared to actual sex, but it hits the spot.

Quicker and more directly than actual sex, in fact. There isn’t the fumbling and adjusting, the laughter-strewn sidetracks, the occasional panic-stricken freezing at a knock on the door, _shit_ , Jimmy playing the margins as ever, starting to rock his hips again even though they both _know_ there’s someone still out there, daring Alastair, a murmur in his ear, _bet I can last longer than you without making a noise_ , Alastair cramming both hands over his mouth because the urge to gasp or groan is suddenly unbearable, the thought of the unseen witness overhearing something both dreadful and irresistible _how does he do this to me_ —

Some days, it’s enough just to hear Jimmy’s voice. Other days, there are fantasies to relate, to lose himself in. A version of this, set in some out of-the-way – but not out-of-the-way _enough_ – storage cupboard at the Oval or something; a door not closed properly. Yeah. This’ll be tonight’s.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“The glow of victory.”

“Is that a nice way of saying sweat, or…?”

“It’s a _nice_ way of saying that Woakesy took six for forty-seven tonight, old man. Hope you’ve been honing your skills over there, or I might just have a new leader for my attack.”

“That Brummie git’d better start looking over his shoulder.”

\--

It’s easy to get carried away, in the heady, mountainous, mercifully cooler beauty of Kandy; but the euphoria is shortlived. Two days later, the Sri Lankans take the sixth match, and with it, the series.

The only question remaining in Alastair’s mind, with one match to go, is what the scale of the series defeat will be; can they salvage at least some pride? That, and exactly how the media will excoriate him, although he can already take a fairly good guess at the latter, having done one press conference last night and another this morning.

Not in the mood, yet, for returning to his room to pack for the trip to Colombo, Alastair wanders outside; finds himself a spot with a view, and a breeze, and no-one around to watch him gather himself.

He’s been asked, of course, if he plans to quit. It’s not a question he understands, not really; how could he desert his team, on the eve of a World Cup?

He calls Pete, to arrange a meeting, this evening. He’s pushing his phone back in his pocket when it buzzes. A text; Jimmy.

_How you doing today? Thinking about you_

Alastair plays it safe, reading for innuendo: _thats got to make training difficult ;)_

Abruptly, an image of Jimmy fills the screen of his phone: emerging from a swimming pool, fully dressed, flimsy white t-shirt and smooth black trousers clinging to him like they’ve been poured straight onto his skin; all shoulders and abs and dark, purposeful, just-you-wait stare.

Alastair gapes at it. Not because he hasn’t seen it before; he’s seen it every night, in fact, ever since Finny got hold of his phone one day and fiddled with something so the photo shows up whenever Jimmy calls. (He’s daydreamed about the picture, too: him lounging by a pool and suddenly Jimmy’s prowling towards him.) He’s startled because it’s the wrong time of day for this, by a good ten hours, at least; so much so he almost doesn’t press the button to take the call.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” says the other man, before Alastair can get a word out.

He swallows. “What are you… Aren’t you…”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” says Alastair, and it’s the fine of _no I’m not_. He wants Jimmy to know this. He doesn’t want to tell him. “You know me.”

A sigh. “I wish I was there.”

Alastair barks a bitter laugh. “Trust me. You don’t.”

Reception, annoyingly, is crystal clear, even across continents. So Alastair can hear every ounce of stiff awkwardness in Jimmy’s voice when he mutters, “I can’t imagine how tough it must be—”

Alastair draws in a breath. He won’t ask for help. (He couldn’t, even if he wanted to, could he? _I can’t give you what you want_.) This situation’s a test of character, of endurance, like anything else; he just has to get through it.

“It’s the job.” He grits his teeth, briefly. “It’s _still_ my job, whatever the press says.”

A job he chose to keep, at the start of the year, despite what it cost him. He has to make _something_ of it, or this whole bloody year will have been for nothing.

“Management still with you?”

“So they say.” Alastair lets his gaze meander along the horizon as he weighs up his next words. The outline of the more distant mountains has gone hazy; more rain coming in. “To be honest… Well. That’s their choice. If they want me out, they can kick me out. I’m _not_ going to do it for them.” He hears a grunt from Jimmy, and realises his tone has sharpened more than he meant it to; that there’s more anger in him, over this, than he realised. He moderates his voice with an effort. “The team needs… There’s no-one else. Not really. Morgs is in worse form than I am, Belly’ll never fly with the selectors… And Joe’s too young. He deserves a few more years to enjoy his cricket, before he gets the burden.”

“So it’s a burden, then?”

Jimmy’s voice, too, has sharpened. Alastair shifts in his seat, floundering mind making him restless.

“No, it’s— I didn’t mean… It’s a privilege. An honour and a privilege.”

There’s a long silence, giving Alastair ample time to rue his runaway tongue. He didn’t mean _he_ finds it a burden. He didn’t. He _doesn’t_. Just that others might. People less stubborn, less committed—

Jimmy, quietly: “Ali… if it’s that bad… why don’t you step down?”

For a moment, Alastair can’t speak. It isn’t anger that’s stopping his throat, but shock.

“I should’ve known,” he manages, at last. “You’re just like Swanny. You think I can’t do it.”

“Bollocks.” The word’s a brisk dismissal; Jimmy’s tone is something else, something Alastair can’t make out past the noise in his own head. “I just think – when does it become more trouble than it’s worth?”

And now Alastair _is_ annoyed; mostly at himself, for assuming Jimmy would support him. For relying on that.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” he snaps. “Like you said. You’re not here.” He ends the call.

Jimmy’s photo flashes up on Alastair’s phone twice more before he makes it back to his hotel room. He ignores it both times, not trusting himself; not wanting to hear any more.

He’s been absorbed in packing for twenty minutes or so when he sees there’s a text:

_Didn’t mean you can’t do it. Just wondering if you have to_

He tries to ignore this, too, but eventually he can’t help himself.

_i don’t give up_

He means to turn off his phone after that; he does. But Jimmy’s reply comes too quickly:

_I know. I’m sorry. Speak to you tonight?_

Alastair bites his lip, sends a last message ( _ok_ ), and does switch off his phone, then. Then he heads downstairs to meet the team bus, trying not to notice who might be avoiding his gaze, who’s suddenly going quiet as he approaches. With a dull, sick feeling in his stomach, he realises that for the first time on this tour, instead of wishing Jimmy were _here_ , he’s wishing _he_ was with Jimmy.

He isn’t going down without a fight. But it’s got all the makings of a very lonely struggle.

He crushes those thoughts; refuses to even _imagine_ deserting his team. Produces a smile, for them all.

\--

“What are you wearing?”

“Why do you always ask that?”

“I like to set the scene.”

“Well, the scene’s the same.”

\--

Alastair’s never believed in karma. He’s as superstitious as the next cricketer, but he just isn’t convinced that payback follows you from one part of your life to another. You make your own luck, with hard work and as much time as it takes.

Irony, though; there’s plenty of that to go around.

Last winter, he grabbed the captaincy with both hands, throwing Kev under a bus in the process. (So some might argue. Who’s he kidding, plenty of people _have_ argued this, one or two even to his face.) Now here he is, just under a year later: hanging on by his fingernails, all over again, to the exact same job. Trying to look as cheerful as possible to anyone who looks his way, all over again, because some things you just don’t admit.

There are a few, well, minor differences, like the fact that at this precise moment he’s slouching in the corner of a too-hot hotel function room, watching his teammates take their turns on camera for Secret Santa. Amid all the predictable banter about hair loss and hygiene, Belly has just said he’s going to buy CJ a bus ticket so he can visit Mo. Nothing like this happened last winter; not enough of them were on speaking terms by the end of the Ashes tour.

But _apart_ from this. There’s an irony to his situation. Right? So he’s thinking about Kev, again, even though he knows he shouldn’t.

The last time Alastair turned Kev down, he knew exactly what he was doing. He had done for years.

However much he got mocked for being slow on the uptake, he could only ignore the obvious for so long. Hard to pretend, even to himself, in a deserted hotel bar some time on his first Ashes tour with Kev’s hand halfway up his thigh and a beery hiss in his ear: _My room or yours?_ It happened several more times after that, too; every six months or so, as if that was how long it took for Kev to forget what the answer had been, last time. _When are you going to stop playing hard to get?_

Trouble was, Alastair was never _playing_. He was trying to be clear, to be firm, without blowing everything up – or losing a friend (because Kev was, still, a friend) – in the process. Alastair _had_ to pull his punches. What other choice did he have? At first, he wasn’t well enough established in the team to risk pissing Kev off; then there was too much at stake. Which meant turning the man down politely, when what Alastair sometimes wanted to do was smack him round the head and say: _Give it up, Kev. Never happening._

It wasn’t that he didn’t find the other man attractive. He did, in a way. He’s always been drawn to insouciance, to the brash sort of confidence that edges on arrogance. It’s why he’s such good friends ( _was_ such good friends) with Swanny; it’s why he latched on to Fred when he joined the team, why he’s always had a weakness for Jimmy’s incessant chat at the crease, even though he knows it’s more performance than reality.

And beyond all that, Kev used to have a way of making Alastair feel like he had every speck of Kev’s considerable attention and energy; like he was the only thing that mattered. Never mind that it wasn’t really true, that Kev always had at least one eye on himself; never mind that Alastair knew that from very early on. When that focus was on him, Alastair felt _seen_ , in a way no-one else has come close to, until these recent months with Jimmy.

But there’s a warmth in all those other men that went missing, somewhere along the line, in Kev; a self-deprecating humour, something to offset the arrogance. Fred and Jimmy and Swanny can all laugh at themselves, to varying degrees; they care about success, they care what others think (who doesn’t?), but neither of these things is all-consuming for them, in the way it became for Kev. Alastair would do almost anything for his team, but being captain meant thinking about the _whole_ team, not just one member of it. Given the slightest chance, Kev would’ve taken everything Alastair could give, until there was nothing left for anyone else.

Alastair saw that – _everyone_ saw that – as clear as day in 2012, when things finally, irrevocably broke down between Kev and Straussy. That autumn, when Alastair brought the man back into the team, he did it with his eyes wide open.

Kev was a razor blade, gleaming and sharp. You had to watch how you handled him, or get cut.

What he never recognised, until the end of last year, was how deeply Kev cut himself, too. But by then, Alastair had been pulling his punches for too long, and the last rejection – in a featureless beige office, with ECB officials and a non-disclosure agreement – was both more brutal and more bloodless than either of them could have predicted.

“Cooky?”

Woakesy’s voice saves Alastair a mental re-run of the meeting itself. He’s not even sure how well he remembers it, anymore; Kev’s version of events, in the Book, doesn’t quite match his.

When he looks up, Woakesy’s wearing that broad, faintly nervous smile that never seems far from his face. Alastair’s wanted to ask him, for a while, how he’s been finding the tour, but it’s a bit late now. He nods, instead.

“You’re up,” says the other man.

Alastair does his bit for the camera, making it a point of principle to choose something both nice and meaningful for Tredders. Then he stands, and pauses, surveying the room. The lads are demob happy at the prospect of going home, even after another defeat: Ravi looks as sleepy as ever, but Ben and Jos are yelling giddy insults at each other across the room, Joe’s running around for no obvious reason, and Titch is making Woakesy laugh so hard he’s gone pink. Finny’s on his phone, and Alastair can tell from his body language that he’s got Broady on the other end; the man doesn’t sit like that (expression rapt, hugging himself) for anyone else.

Joe stops, glances towards Alastair, who shakes his head, and steps out of the room. Lifting his own phone to his ear, he brings up the number he wants without even needing to glance at the screen.

Suppresses a sigh, before he speaks.

“Distract me?”

**Author's Note:**

> You want links? I got your links:
> 
> \- as ever, full details of every match, and related photos and other media, are [available at Cricinfo](http://www.espncricinfo.com/sri-lanka-v-england-2014-15/engine/series/750619.html).
> 
> \- I always knew I wanted to do a part for this series focusing on Alastair in isolation, and the fact that he was isolated, on the Sri Lanka ODI tour. I had a vague idea that, Jimmy being absent, phone sex might feature. But [Jimmy's interview with Vithushan Ehantharajah for _All Out Cricket_](http://www.alloutcricket.com/features/jimmy-anderson-record-breaker) (conducted in December 2014, though not published until April 2015) turned the vague plan into a running theme, mostly because my fic brain intervened when I came to this bit:
>
>> _Anderson may not have been on that Sri Lanka tour but his friend Alastair Cook was. Hours after our meeting Cook is relieved of his duties as ODI captain and left out of the World Cup squad._
>> 
>> _Anderson had watched the matches from afar and with great disappointment. While the pressure was ramping up on Cook, Anderson spoke regularly to him – unsurprising, given they have been tight for a decade. “Honestly, it’s been hard work listening to it on TV and seeing the media reaction to it, on Twitter and in the papers,” he says. “It’s sad to see him struggle like this. He had a tough summer, with a lot of people on his back. He got it together at the end of the Test series but then the ODIs came and they were straight back on him.”_   
> 
> 
> **fic brain** : "spoke regularly" --> nightly phone sex, _duh_
> 
> \- [here is a report](http://www.espncricinfo.com/sri-lanka-v-england-2014-15/content/story/805441.html) on Kevin Pietersen's comments after the second ODI; see also [this](http://leatheronwillow.tumblr.com/post/104121603750/eyyyy-he-did-not) for cricket fam commentary on the episode.
> 
> \- the editions of Ravi Bopara's _All Out Cricket_ diaries that cover this tour are [here](http://www.alloutcricket.com/blogs/ravis-diary-issue-8) and [here](http://www.alloutcricket.com/blogs/ravis-diary-issue-9).
> 
> \- the Secret Santa video is [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgItLksfR4o).
> 
> \- in terms of callbacks to past fic, [the last chapter of 'When We're Not Pretending'](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6990973/chapters/16257314) is when Cooky and Swanny fell out; there was a bit more about Alastair's crush on Fred in ['Just a Bit of Fun', chapter 2](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3098189/chapters/6830906) (and chapter 4 of the same fic is when Alastair mentioned having had, um, 'offers' from other guys).
> 
> Finally, thanks also to twistsofsilver, for the delightful mental image of Jimmy prowling towards Alastair at the swimming pool.


End file.
